Viacom plans 2nd production venture in China
(Agencies)
Updated: 2004-09-24 14:30

Viacom Inc., the third-largest U.S. media company, will start its second production venture in China and has won wider distribution for its MTV music channel, Chief Executive Sumner Redstone said.

The company and Beijing Television reached a verbal agreement to co-produce Chinese-language music and entertainment programs in the Chinese capital, Redstone said. Viacom is already hiring employees for a children's programming venture with Shanghai Media Group announced in March, he said.

Viacom is vying with rivals such as News Corp. and Time Warner Inc. to enter China, which has 1.3 billion people and is the world's seventh-largest economy. China, which tightly controls the media to help safeguard Communist Party rule, has eased some restrictions on overseas broadcasters.

China in March dropped a ban on overseas investment in film and television producers.
Viacom's effort to achieve full distribution in China will probably proceed in many small steps over 10 to 15 years, said Vivek Couto, a Hong Kong-based analyst with consultants Media Partners Asia Ltd.

Viacom's Shanghai venture has started developing its first programs in advance of formal approval by the State Administration of Radio Film and Television, and expects to start distribution early next year, said Redstone who was in Hong Kong yesterday to attend a Forbes Global CEO conference. Chinese officials have given the tie-up verbal approval, he said.

In March, Redstone said the venture would broadcast an initial nine hours a day to 8 million households around Shanghai. Yesterday, he said Viacom anticipates formal approval in time for the first co-productions to be made in early 2005.

New York-based Viacom also announced that China Central Television will buy more episodes of the "Wild Thornberrys" and "CatDog" animated series produced by Nickelodeon, the U.S. company's children's channel. The companies are in talks to have Viacom air China Central children's programs in the U.S. and to have China Central buy more Nickelodeon programs.

Viacom didn't give the ownership, investment or schedule for the Beijing Television venture. Charles Chau, Viacom's managing director for North Asia, said in an interview in July that the company's investment in the Shanghai Media Group venture was "several million dollars."

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